_Parson._--"You take for your motto this aphorism[K]--'_Knowledge is
Power._'--BACON."
_Riccabocca._--"Bacon make such an aphorism! The last man in the world
to have said any thing so pert and so shallow."
_Leonard_ (astonished).--"Do you mean to say, sir, that that aphorism is
not in Lord Bacon! Why, I have seen it quoted as his in almost every
newspaper, and in almost every speech in favor of popular education."
_Riccabocca._--"Then that should be a warning to you never again to fall
into the error of the would-be scholar--viz. quote second-hand. Lord
Bacon wrote a great book to show in what knowledge is power, how that
power should be defined, in what it might be mistaken. And, pray, do you
think so sensible a man would ever have taken the trouble to write a
great book upon the subject, if he could have packed up all he had to
say into the portable dogma, 'Knowledge is power?' Pooh! no such
aphorism is to be found in Bacon from the first page of his writings to
the last."
_Parson_ (candidly).--"Well, I supposed it was Lord Bacon's, and I am
very glad to hear that the aphorism has not the sanction of his
authority."
_Leonard_ (recovering his surprise).--"But why so?"
_Parson._--"Because it either says a great deal too much, or
just--nothing at all."
_Leonard._--"At least, sir, it seems to be undeniable."
_Parson._--"Well, grant that it is undeniable. Does it prove much in
favor of knowledge? Pray, is not ignorance power too?"
_Riccabocca._--"And a power that has had much the best end of the
quarter-staff."
_Parson._--"All evil is power, and does its power make it any thing the
better?"
_Riccabocca._--"Fanaticism is power--and a power that has often swept
away knowledge like a whirlwind. The Mussulman burns the library of a
world--and forces the Koran and the sword from the schools of Byzantium
to the colleges of Hindostan."
_Parson_ (bearing on with a new column of illustration).--"Hunger is
power. The barbarians, starved out of their energy by their own swarming
population, swept into Italy and annihilated letters. The Romans,
however degraded, had more knowledge, at least, than the Gaul and the
Visigoth."
_Riccabocca_ (bringing up the reserve).--"And even in Greece, when Greek
met Greek, the Athenians--our masters in all knowledge--were beat by the
Spartans, who held learning in contempt."
_Parson._--"Wherefore you see, Leonard, that though knowledge be power,
it is only _one_ of the powers of the world; that there are others as
strong, and often much stronger; and the assertion either means but a
barren truism, not worth so frequent a repetition, or it means something
that you would find it very difficult to prove."
_Leonard._--"One nation may be beaten by another that has more physical
strength and more military discipline; which last, permit me to say,
sir, is a species of knowledge;--"
_Riccabocca._--"Yes; but your knowledge-mongers at present call upon us
to discard military discipline, and the qualities that produce it, from
the list of the useful arts. And in your own essay, you insist upon
knowledge as the great disbander of armies, and the foe of all military
discipline."
_Parson._--"Let the young man proceed. Nations, you say, may be beaten
by other nations less learned and civilized?"
_Leonard._--"But knowledge elevates a class. I invite my own humble
order to knowledge, because knowledge will lift them into power."
_Riccabocca._--"What do you say to that, Mr. Dale?"
_Parson._--"In the first place, is it true that the class which has the
most knowledge gets the most power? I suppose philosophers, like my
friend Dr. Riccabocca, think they have the most knowledge. And pray, in
what age have philosophers governed the world? Are they not always
grumbling that nobody attends to them?"
"Per Bacco," said Riccabocca, "if people had attended to us, it would
have been a droll sort of world by this time!"
_Parson._--"Very likely. But, as a general rule, those have the most
knowledge who give themselves up to it the most. Let us put out of the
question philosophers (who are often but ingenious lunatics), and speak
only of erudite scholars, men of letters and practical science,
professors, tutors, and fellows of colleges. I fancy any member of
Parliament would tell us that there is no class of men which has less
actual influence on public affairs. They have more knowledge than
manufacturers and ship-owners, squires and farmers; but, do you find
that they have more power over the Government and the votes of the House
of Commons!"
"They ought to have," said Leonard.
"Ought they?" said the Parson: "we'll consider that later. Meanwhile,
you must not escape from your own proposition, which is that knowledge
_is_ power--not that it _ought_ to be. Now, even granting your
corollary, that the power of a class is therefore proportioned to its
knowledge--pray, do you suppose that while your order, the operatives,
are instructing themselves, all the rest of the community are to be at a
stand-still? Diffuse knowledge as you may, you will never produce
equality of knowledge. Those who have most leisure, application, and
aptitude for learning, will still know the most. Nay, by a very natural
law, the more general the appetite for knowledge, the more the increased
competition would favor those most adapted to excel by circumstances and
nature. At this day, there is a vast increase of knowledge spread over
all society, compared with that in the Middle Ages; but is there not a
still greater distinction between the highly-educated gentleman and the
intelligent mechanic, than there was then between the baron who could
not sign his name and the churl at the plough? between the accomplished
statesman, versed in all historical law, and the voter whose politics
are formed by his newspaper, than there was between the legislator who
passed laws against witches, and the burgher who defended his guild from
some feudal aggression? between the enlightened scholar and the dunce of
to-day, than there was between the monkish alchemist and the blockhead
of yesterday? Peasant, voter, and dunce of this century are no doubt
wiser than the churl, burgher, and blockhead of the twelfth. But the
gentleman, statesman, and scholar of the present age are at least quite
as favorable a contrast to the alchemist, witch-burner, and baron of
old. As the progress of enlightenment has done hitherto, so will it ever
do. Knowledge is like capital: the more there is in a country, the
greater the disparities in wealth between one man and another.
Therefore, if the working class increase in knowledge, so do the other
classes; and if the working class rise peacefully and legitimately into
power, it is not in proportion to their own knowledge alone, but rather
according as it seems to the knowledge of the other orders of the
community, that such augmentation of proportional power is just, and
safe, and wise."
Placed between the Parson and the Philosopher, Leonard felt that his
position was not favorable to the display of his forces. Insensibly he
edged his chair somewhat away, and said mournfully:
"Then, according to you, the reign of knowledge would be no great
advance in the aggregate freedom and welfare of man?"
_Parson._--"Let us define. By knowledge, do you mean intellectual
cultivation?--by the reign of knowledge, the ascendency of the most
cultivated minds?"
_Leonard_ (after a pause).--"Yes."
_Riccabocca._--"Oh indiscreet young man, that is an unfortunate
concession of yours; for the ascendency of the most cultivated minds
would be a terrible obligarchy!"
_Parson._--"Perfectly true; and we now reply to your exclamation, that
men who, by profession, have most learning ought to have more influence
than squires and merchants, farmers and mechanics. Observe, all the
knowledge that we mortals can acquire is not knowledge positive and
perfect, but knowledge comparative, and subject to all the errors and
passions of humanity. And suppose that you could establish, as the sole
regulators of affairs, those who had the most mental cultivation, do you
think they would not like that power well enough to take all means their
superior intelligence could devise to keep it to themselves? The
experiment was tried of old by the priests of Egypt; and in the empire
of China, at this day, the aristocracy are elected from those who have
most distinguished themselves in learned colleges. If I may call myself
a member of that body, 'the people,' I would rather be an Englishman,
however much displeased with dull Ministers and blundering Parliaments,
than I would be a Chinese under the rule of the picked sages of the
Celestial Empire. Happily, therefore, my dear Leonard, nations are
governed by many things besides what is commonly called knowledge; and
the greatest practical ministers, who, like Themistocles, have made
small states great--and the most dominant races who, like the Romans,
have stretched their rule from a village half over the universe--have
been distinguished by various qualities which a philosopher would sneer
at, and a knowledge-monger would call 'sad prejudices,' and 'lamentable
errors of reason.'"
_Leonard_ (bitterly).--"Sir, you make use of knowledge itself to argue
against knowledge."
_Parson._--"I make use of the little I know to prove the foolishness of
idolatry. I do not argue against knowledge; I argue against
knowledge-worship. For here, I see in your Essay, that you are not
contented with raising human knowledge into something like divine
omnipotence, you must also confound her with virtue. According to you,
we have only to diffuse the intelligence of the few among the many, and
all at which we preachers aim is accomplished. Nay more; for whereas we
humble preachers have never presumed to say, with the heathen Stoic,
that even virtue is sure of happiness below (though it be the best road
to it), you tell us plainly that this knowledge of yours gives not only
the virtue of a saint, but bestows the bliss of a God. Before the steps
of your idol the evils of life disappear. To hear you, one has but 'to
know,' in order to be exempt from the sins and sorrows of the ignorant.
Has it ever been so? Grant that you diffuse amongst the many all the
knowledge ever attained by the few. Have the wise few been so unerring
and so happy? You supposed that your motto was accurately cited from
Bacon. What was Bacon himself? The poet tells you:
'The wisest, brightest, _meanest_ of mankind.'
Can you hope to bestow upon the vast mass of your order the luminous
intelligence of this 'Lord Chancellor of nature?' Grant that you do
so--and what guarantee have you for the virtue and the happiness which
you assume as the concomitants of the gift? See Bacon himself; what
black ingratitude! what miserable self-seeking! what truckling
servility! what abject and pitiful spirit! So far from intellectual
knowledge, in its highest form and type, insuring virtue and bliss, it
is by no means uncommon to find great mental cultivation combined with
great moral corruption." (Aside to Riccabocca)--"Push on, will you?"
_Riccabocca._--"A combination remarkable in eras as in individuals.
Petronius shows us a state of morals at which a commonplace devil would
blush, in the midst of a society more intellectually cultivated than
certainly was that which produced Regulus or the Horatii. And the most
learned eras in modern Italy were precisely those which brought the
vices into the most ghastly refinement."
_Leonard_ (rising in great agitation, and clasping his hands).--"I
cannot contend with you, who produce against information so slender and
crude as mine the stores which have been locked from my reach. But I
feel that there must be another side to this shield--a shield that you
will not even allow to be silver. And, oh, if you thus speak of
knowledge, why have you encouraged me to know?"